Evening Watch: April 2009

I forgot all about NaPoWriMo. I intend to write haiku. A poem a day is the goal. My first six are below.

April 1
DC has the cherry blossoms
We have mud season

April 2
In the calmness of morning
how wonderful my daughter’s pictures

April 3
My bamboo grows high
but not from measured care

April 4
There are no birds flying
during April showers

April 5
Rain floods driving streets
soaking Boston walkers

April 6
Umbrellas are plentiful
but often inside out

New Published Poem

Wilderness House Literary Review has posted their new issue! You can check out my poem "Eden--A Brothel Near Gdynia" at this link.* I encourage you to check out the whole issue at www.whlreview.com

*Direct PDF link

Full poem after the break.

Saturday, April 4, 2009

Review--Highlander: the Source

AAAAAGGHH! Urgh, ugh, ugga, aack, eraaack, aaataa.*

*the sounds my brain made as it tried to strangle itself.

Rest of the post after the break.

The movie is STUPID.

Now that that is out of my system, I can continue. I am a huge Highlander fan. I have been since roughly 1992 when I saw the first Highlander movie on tv as a precursor to the then new tv series. I saw the abominations that were II and III, and began to think of Duncan from the tv show as the only real Highlander. Now, after having suffered through both Endgame and the Source, I am re-evaluating my entire thought process.

I watched just about every episode when they aired or shortly thereafter. When the SciFi channel had them in rerun slots in the early 2000s, I used to watch them then too. My best friend and I had copies of Queen's It's a Kind of Magic and used to listen to "Princes of the Universe" while driving not long after we got our licenses. I had a Highlander poster and desperately wanted a repro-claymore and a dragon-headed katana. I own 3 of the seasons on DVD and am trying to collect the rest. I own all the movies (except the Source). I say all of this to highlight how much of a fanboy I was. I was so bad, in fact, I even made excuses for horrible plot holes and tried to rationalize everything stupid that has ever been done in the name of Highlander, including the spin-off tv shows.

So, when I tell you to think back to my recent review of Hawk the Slayer, and to consider what I wrote about Hawk being the singular worst movie I've ever seen, and then tell you, right now, that Highlander: the Source has promoted Hawk the Slayer to only the second worst movie I've ever watched, you'll have an idea of just how much I detested this loathsome film. There is nothing, and I will repeat that, nothing redeemable about this movie. The fact that the principle cast from the tv show would even remotely consider wanting to be associated with this mountain of rotted human sewage has lowered their esteem in my eyes to that of a bilge rat. I can't even bring myself to describe the asinine "plot" because the ideas are so atrocious that they make the idea that Immortals are aliens or time-travel agents (from II, and II--the Renegade Edition, respectively) seem completely sane and rational. If the Mythbusters were to do a comparison of plot-lines within the variant source material over the years, they would prove beyond the shadow of a doubt that the idea of alien Immortals is not just plausible, but confirmed, all just to avoid even attempting to scientifically examine this crap.

If you have even one iota, one speck, one single modicum of support of the Highlander brand, or even if you have seen it and don't care either way, PLEASE don't watch this piece of intestinal muck. I'm not kidding when I say that the brand has been so tainted in my head as to make Jar-Jar Binks' effect on Star Wars seem like the most trivial nonsense. Han shooting first doesn't make me hate Lucas anywhere near as much as the Source makes me despise everything about the entire Highlander universe.

Have I made myself clear?

/rant

Wednesday, April 1, 2009

Abandoned Chair

The Somerville News has my poem "Abandoned Chair" in the April 1st issue.

Poem after the break.